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For RISC-V, it's extensions all the way down. The mandatory core is tiny and all the value (outside of minuscule microcontrollers) is in the extensions. It mak
by dkjaudyeqooe 2y ago
For RISC-V, it's extensions all the way down. The mandatory core is tiny and all the value (outside of minuscule microcontrollers) is in the extensions.
It makes more sense if you think about it like programming libraries. That's the same 'mess', but it's not a problem.
There is often fear of 'fragmentation', but vendors tend to be highly responsive to their target market and competitors for each application and will coalesce around a set of extensions that make sense.
The other thing I'd add is that the one thing worse than having 'yet another extension' is not having the extension you need. Extensions are a response to market demand.
- mikepurvis 2y agoSpeaking as someone with zero actual domain knowledge, my concern would be about ensuring that disparate extensions have consistent interfaces and can cooperate with each other. I don't know how that would work at a hardware design level, but the thing to avoid would be whatever is the analogue of the rust/async fiasco, where certain components only really work properly with others within their own "sub" ecosystem.